A Eulogy for Presence
I’m mourning a time before algorithms.
A time when phones were for conversations,
when a ringing tone meant someone wanted you,
not your attention,
not your data,
not another piece of your day.
I’m mourning a time when we logged onto Facebook
from a wired computer in the corner of the house,
uploading photos to an album
days after the weekend had ended,
reliving memories instead of broadcasting them in real time.
A time when music lived on an iPod,
carefully chosen,
synced song by song,
a soundtrack we carried
rather than an endless feed choosing for us.
I’m mourning a time when we weren’t chained
to little glowing rectangles,
carrying the entire world in our pockets
and somehow feeling more disconnected than ever.
A time when people looked at each other
instead of through each other,
when silence wasn’t filled by scrolling,
when waiting in line meant daydreaming,
when dinner tables held conversations
instead of screens.
I miss a world
where moments belonged to the people living them,
not the platforms collecting them.
There were boundaries then
between online and offline,
between being available and being alone.
Maybe I’m not mourning the absence of algorithms at all.
Maybe I’m mourning the parts of ourselves
we traded away
for convenience,
for connection,
for an endless stream of everything
and somehow,
less of each other.
